Still Using Outdated Technology? It Might be Costing You More Than You Think

For many businesses, a technology upgrade can be quite daunting – They’re usually expensive and quite complicated – difficult to justify for a small-medium sized business that is already juggling competing financial demands.  

Technology is one area that should not be neglected, however, as postponing a technology upgrade can often prove more costly than the alternative. Older technology becomes exponentially more expensive and difficult to maintain over time and will ultimately lead to decreased productivity and increased system downtime. A new report from the Cabinet Office in the UK indicates that the British Government spends at least $2.3 bn per year maintaining legacy systems, which makes up half of their total IT spending. The worst part? These legacy systems routinely fail to meet even the minimum cybersecurity requirements despite their massive cost.  

Here’s why holding on to outdated technology for too long can do more harm to your business than good: 

Legal and Regulatory Compliance  

You might be surprised to learn that auditors can actually fine companies for failing to transition from unsupported software and systems. There is a common misconception that only law or healthcare companies need to worry about legal or regulatory compliance, but there are many compliance requirements that apply to any company that handles employee data or payment information. Using only technology only serves to exacerbate compliance risks that you might not even know about.  

The best way to know if your organization is meeting security regulations and guidelines is to consult with a managed security services provider like Stratejm, who can provide a full assessment of your systems and network and determine where there might be any compliance issues.  

Increased Maintenance & Support Costs 

It is well known at this point that outdated technology is expensive to maintain, with costs growing exponentially over time to the point that it would have been cheaper to just upgrade in the first place. Something that might be a little less obvious, however, is that the performance of these outdated machines is also going to degrade – Parts will begin to fail and components will need repair, which means increased system downtime and less employee productivity. Old technology generally runs slower and takes longer to execute tasks – so much so that Microsoft estimates that small businesses using outdated computers could lose up to seven days per calendar year.  

At this point, the choice becomes rather clear – Would you rather cling to outdated systems that will become a money-pit and performance bottleneck? Or would you rather pay the upfront cost of the upgrade and get all the benefits that come with it? 

Security Risks 

Outdated technology and software are some of the easiest ways to open your organization up to countless security vulnerabilities. For example, someone still running Windows XP is 6 times more likely to be infected with malware threats than someone running Windows 10. All legacy systems will become unsupported eventually, and unsecure, legacy software, therefore, represents a potentially huge hole within an organization’s network security system.  

Managing Upgrade Costs 

The process of upgrading and maintaining IT infrastructure can be quite the nasty (and incredibly expensive) cycle. Designing, configuring & implementing new infrastructure anytime an upgrade is needed can be tedious and complicated, especially for something like security which is mostly preventative in nature. 

Luckily, we now have flexible, cloud-based solutions that can offer turnkey, enterprise-grade security while maintaining flexibility and keeping costs down. Stratejm provides a comprehensive, streamlined solution for enterprise security that requires no hardware or software commitments upfront.